Roundabout crash driver, 89, the centre of attention

AN 89-year-old Warrnambool woman was taken to Warrnambool Base Hospital after driving her car into a light pole at the centre of the Lava and Fairy streets roundabout yesterday afternoon.

The elderly driver’s badly damaged Mercedes sedan came to rest on the large bluestone roundabout. 140610AM20 Picture: ANGELA MILNE

AN 89-year-old Warrnambool woman was taken to Warrnambool Base Hospital after driving her car into a light pole at the centre of the Lava and Fairy streets roundabout yesterday afternoon.

Senior Constable Steve Gray, of Warrnambool police, said the woman believed there was a problem with the car’s brakes.

Senior Constable Gray said the woman had been driving south along Fairy Street about 2.45pm when she drove across pedestrian islands and crashed on to the roundabout, hitting the central light pole.

He said it was fortunate there was no other traffic going through the roundabout at the time.

Airbags in the woman’s black Mercedes sedan deployed on impact. The driver suffered general soreness but her car was extensively damaged.

Meanwhile, a man died in an early-morning crash at Dartmoor yesterday.

The man was driving a tractor, heading west, when he collided head-on with an eastbound B-double log truck 100 metres from the Glenelg River Bridge on the Princes Highway before 5.30am.

Both vehicles burst into flames, the tractor being pushed back on to the bridge. Its driver died at the scene.

The 55-year-old truck driver was taken to Mount Gambier hospital with serious injuries. The Princes Highway at Dartmoor was closed all day as investigators tried to piece together the circumstances of the accident.

Westbound traffic was diverted to the Glenelg Highway at Casterton and via Winnap-Nelson Road.

Eastbound traffic was sent via the Portland-Nelson Road in Mount Gambier.

The man’s death took the state’s road toll to 112, six more than the same time last year.